Flight Centre Australia, one of the world’s largest international travel companies, wanted to cater to its savvy and well-connected world traveler clientele by modernizing stores to create an impactful retail travel experience. As part of a broader strategy to enhance the in-store experience, Flight Centre partnered with TechMedia to implement and support a digital signage solution with Scala. The solution needed to be robust, easy to use, scalable and implemented in 2500 stores worldwide with a variety of screens from video walls to 84-inch 4K-display. It also needed to be capable of incorporating third-party data sources and have the flexibility to be adapted locally to current in-store audiences.

Flight Centre knew the importance of measuring the success of such a huge communications strategy overhaul, so the legacy print signage was measured against the new digital installation. The impact of the digital signage was immediate and strong with a proven, measured increase in both views and attention time from paper pricing boards compared to the digital pricing boards. The award-winning solution is currently in more than 300 stores with 700 screens.

Quick Facts

Flight Centre Australia, one of the world’s largest international travel outlets, wanted to modernize retail stores by introducing digital signage. The award-winning project is:

Currently found on 700 in-store and street-facing screens in 300 stores using 600 players

As Australia’s largest travel retailer, Flight Centre decided in late 2013 to modernize its stores with more engaging, informative and entertaining communications to travel seekers at the point-of-decision, as well as using digital to draw in potential customers passing by the outlets. The digital strategy, executed in mid-2014, integrates back office systems to provide a quick speed-to-market for special deals, highlights unique and short-lived specials, as well as uses screens that play full-motion high-definition (HD) and 4K video of popular travel destinations. Additionally, business information such as real-time foreign exchange currency rates and dynamic airline ticketing prices is integrated into the content.

Signage in-store is dynamically updated to reflect the current customer demographic while street-facing screens attract passersby with eye-catching content. The project criteria included providing each store with a combination of screens including: a single- or dual-portrait HD-screen configuration, a dual-portrait and single-landscape HD-screen, a 4K video wall comprised of four HD screens and a single 84-inch 4K screen. Stores have a strategically placed mix of portrait screens in the windows and landscape video wall or 4K screen inside.

“Scala’s incredible playback engine addressed each of the complicated project scenarios easily. Flight Centre has a large number of 84” 4K displays deployed and required a tool to create dynamic 4K content. Scala Designer provided the tool that produced the highest quality playback with the lowest impact on the corporate networks bandwidth.” -Norman Cantrell, Managing Director, TechMedia

Although the solution is centrally managed via playlists in Scala Enterprise Content Manager, associates at individual stores can dynamically update screen content using a tablet to select destinations of interest to the current in-store audience and “fling” related information, including full-motion HD video, to the screens. Additionally, Flight Centre uses Scala Designer templates and metadata to create targeted pricing specials, generating promotional content in real-time based on pricing data and targeting criteria.

To measure the success digital signage had versus the printed signs, audience impression measurement analytics was deployed to measure the number of people looking at the signs as well as the time spent reading the signs. Embedded cameras and sensors captured audience reaction to the old printed posters and, after the digital screens were installed, the same measures were used to gauge the reaction to the digital. Overwhelmingly, the digital signs were resonating with audiences and were more impactful. Michael Frost, from Flight Center retail digital experience, noted that there was an 89% increase in views and a 52% increase in attention time from the paper signs to the digital signage.

“Introducing digital communications with our customers has been an overwhelming success as our measured analysis of the project proves. Worldwide we’re considered a forward-thinking company and the TechMedia solution built on the Scala platform is reliable, powerful and exceeded our project requirements with ease-of-use and flexibility.” -Michael Frost, Retail Digital Experience Flight Centre

The final solution was runner-up for the top prize for Digital Experience at the Sydney Design Awards 2015 and took home the bronze for the 2015 POPAI Digital Signage awards.